{"id":452291,"date":"2026-06-26T03:31:48","date_gmt":"2026-06-26T10:31:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=452291"},"modified":"2026-06-26T03:31:50","modified_gmt":"2026-06-26T10:31:50","slug":"australia-threw-renewable-energy-away-at-record-levels-in-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=452291","title":{"rendered":"Australia threw \u201crenewable\u201d energy away at record levels in 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

From CFACT<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Joanne Nova<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The more we make, the more we waste. The trend is clear and it\u2019s so Soviet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spring is the season with the most wasted renewable production, and each spring is more wasteful than the one before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
AEMO QED 2025 <\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

There are two sorts of \u201ccurtailment\u201d where the generator has to shut off production.  Network curtailment<\/strong> happens when a a transmission line is already at capacity, or a line is down . But Economic Curtailment i<\/strong>s rapidly becoming the big drain. It occurs when there was such a glut of power that prices went negative. Generators were producing something so useless they had to pay people to take it away. Investors flee at this point. This is hidden under jargon called \u201cOffloading\u201d which sounds a bit like 4-wheel driving with a lisp. I mean, they could have called it \u201ctoxic energy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the AEMO Q4 report<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDuring Q4 2025, total economic offloading of wind and grid-scale solar generation averaged 1,312 MW,<\/strong> the highest quarterly average on record (Figure 45). This exceeded the previous peak set in Q4 2024 by 653 MW (+99%).
Grid-scale solar economic offloading rose sharply, increasing from 343 MW to an all-time high of 618 MW (+275 MW, +80%). As a share of average grid-scale solar availability, offloading increased from 13% to 18%.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So nearly one fifth of all the electricity that solar panels produced was tossed in the bin. And about 15% of wind turbine capacity. In South Australia an extraordinary 59% of potential energy from solar was lost. In total, some 7.2 Terawatt hours of renewable electricity was thrown away last year, because it was made at the wrong time or in the wrong place. As Dan Lee describes it on WattClarity,<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201d 1 TWh is roughly equivalent to the entire production from Gladstone Power Station Unit 4 in 2025\u2033<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So we\u2019re wasting about 7 turbine units\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the latest figures for the first quarter of 2026 the curtailment figures are back down again, but they are still higher than the same time last year. The inexorable rise of \u201ccurtailment\u201d continues season by season.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"
AEMO QED<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

This is not the same as the \u201cwaste\u201d of having spare gas or coal generators because they are despatchable, and wind and solar are not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unlike most things, as we make more wind and solar power generators they wont get more efficient, not in a net production kind of way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This post originally appeared at the great JoNova<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

_____________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joanne Nova<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A prize-winning science graduate in molecular biology. She has given keynotes about the medical revolution, gene technology and aging at conferences. She hosted a children\u2019s TV series on Channel Nine, and has done over 200 radio interviews, many on the Australian ABC. She was formerly an associate lecturer in Science Communication at the ANU. She\u2019s author of The Skeptics Handbook which has been translated into 15 languages. Each day 5,000 people read joannenova.com.au<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The more we make, the more we waste. The trend is clear and it\u2019s so Soviet.<\/p>\n

Spring is the season with the most wasted renewable production, and each spring is more wasteful than the one before.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":452303,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691818216,691818656,691819094,691818412,691843818,691818728],"class_list":["post-452291","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-australia","tag-electricity","tag-renewable-green-energy","tag-solar-panels","tag-toxic-energy","tag-wind-and-solar","fallback-thumbnail"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/AQO1aDQ5czjf30m-oZ8ENpb502ffuDkTL0JDwl5yWtxUT2MyxznbQ7NJbKfIYOcj5gn5zFBQW85EgHIHG90h_6pW2bpJ5CyPgoCiq2Ngy0eEnboARJHNTI3XerEBMavY.jpeg?fit=1120%2C943&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1TF1","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":245975,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=245975","url_meta":{"origin":452291,"position":0},"title":"CFACT presents Jo Nova with the Dauntless Purveyor of Climate Truth Award 2023","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"02\/27\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"At the Heartland Institute\u2019s 15th International Conference on Climate Change in Orlando, FL, CFACT presented Joanne Nova with its Dauntless Purveyor of Climate Truth Award for 2023.","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/image-911.png?fit=848%2C565&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/image-911.png?fit=848%2C565&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/image-911.png?fit=848%2C565&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/image-911.png?fit=848%2C565&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":447366,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=447366","url_meta":{"origin":452291,"position":1},"title":"Australian renewable investments evaporated in 2025 reaching a ten-year low","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"05\/30\/2026","format":false,"excerpt":"Australia is supposed to be going hell for leather to install renewables in order to pretend it has a chance of making Labor\u2019s 82% reduction in emissions target by 2030. 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